Los Angeles County supervisors on Tuesday approved a $1.85-million payment to settle a whistleblower lawsuit brought by a former county social worker who alleged he had uncovered a pattern of systemic misconduct that endangered thousands of children, records show.
According to an amended civil complaint filed in L.A. County Superior Court on June 23, 2020, Dennis Finn was a social worker with the county’s Department of Children and Family Services for 24 years when he was fired on May 22, 2019, after repeatedly raising his concerns with the department and becoming a whistleblower for California state officials.
Finn’s suspicions of misconduct arose following the death of Gabriel Fernandez, the complaint stated. The 8-year-old boy died on May 24, 2013, two days after he was beaten in his Palmdale home.
A Times review of confidential documents in the days after his death revealed that county social workers left Gabriel in the care of his mother and his mother’s boyfriend despite six investigations into abuse allegations involving the mother over the previous decade.
Gabriel’s mother, Pearl Sinthia Fernandez, was sentenced to life without parole in 2018. Her boyfriend, Isauro Aguirre, received a death sentence.
The case put DCFS under intense scrutiny. Officials assembled a Blue Ribbon Commission on Child Protection, which recommended a series of reforms.
Finn, meanwhile, started digging.
By 2016, he’d noted ongoing issues similar to the delayed or inappropriate responses...
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